Clue Carey
"Tw Gota Clue"

Clue is an affectionate and snuggly dog. He is vocal and playful and becomes very attached to his human companions. Clue is completely housebroken and we trust him to be free in the house without hesitation. He needs a family who can give him some individual attention each day since he is very dependent on his human companions for affection. Clue is a great dog with a very funny personality! But no cats please. Clue was adoped on 06/26/2005 by Brian and Allison Carey.

TW Gota Clue 9/4/2000 - 11/6/2008

Clue did not wake up from his dental today. This was such a hard call for me because he had trouble waking up the last time he was under anesthesia. Clue has had troubles with his teeth since I’ve had him. I have religiously brushed his teeth once weekly until the last time when I increased it to daily brushing and with very few exceptions he did get them brushed every day. The past few weeks or maybe even a month he has had a lot of gum bleeding with his brushings and I was beginning to feel bad about putting him through it, but with him it really was necessary. Saturday he had his regular check up at the vet and I asked her to take a look at his teeth since a really bad odor had just started to emanate from his mouth. She took a look and found an abscess and we decided it was time for yet another dental. I asked for full x-rays of his mouth because I worried so much about him being in pain.

Well, you all know the rest. He was put under late this morning and had his teeth cleaned. Dr. Rutsey called to say that he would be losing 12 or 13 teeth and I told her to go ahead. It was my hope that, once the offending bad teeth were removed, Clue could go in less often for dentals and he would eat better and feel better. She called again just after lunch to say that only ½ of his mouth had been done and she wanted to wake him up because he’d been under for an hour. A little while later she called to say he was having trouble waking up and I asked her if I should be leaving my office to come and be with him and she told me not yet. At 1:06 p.m. I received the call that he had gone into cardiac arrest and they were not able to save him.

I left my office in tears and Clue was wrapped in a red plaid blanket when I got there. His ears were cold but the rest of him was still warm. The office staff were very kind and allowed me to cry over him for almost two hours.

Clue was my first foster dog. He came to me not long after I adopted Simon in October 2004. His owner, Eddie Woods called me at work one day in December to tell me Simon’s littermate, Clue, was retiring and he’d like to re-home Clue through GEM. I was pretty new at the time and had no idea how complicated running an adoption group is and I told Eddie I’d check with Helen to see if we could take Clue. Helen just about strangled me and finally she said, “I haven’t got a foster home for him, so you’re going to have to take him!” I told her I would and I took the foster family training that was conducted that year at Ives’ house. A lot of behind the scenes stuff went on after that that I was barely aware of at that time. Clue was in Missouri at Eddie Woods’ farm and we had a bunch of John Taylor dogs scheduled to come to GEM in January. Arrangements had to be made to get Clue from Missouri to Kansas and it took a little longer than anticipated and finally, on March 17, 2005 I was once again at Ives’ house waiting for a dog hauler to arrive with my foster dog. It was my first dog drop and I was so excited to see my foster dog. Sandy got each dog off the hauler and handed over leashes to various volunteers. Clue was the last dog off the hauler and when she handed over the leash she said, “We call this one the Wild Child!” Oh, what had I gotten myself into?

It was soon very evident that I was nowhere near dog savvy enough to handle this dog. He peed in the house, chased the cat, destroyed crates and muzzles and growled at me when I attempted to take a toy away from him. In tears I called Elizabeth Augustyn for help and she told me, “Clue’s not a bad dog; he’s just scared,” and she began to coach me through scaredy dog 101. Clue was afraid of the ice cube maker, the kid’s little bikes they rode down the sidewalk, police and ambulance sirens, the ice cream truck and a variety of other weird sounds. He dragged me across a parking lot when the fire truck sounded it’s siren at the Memorial Day Parade in Keego Harbor and Merrie West let me hide Clue in her van until he calmed down. He dragged me through the woods near my house chasing a deer and also through the woods in my back yard going after a squirrel.

When I wanted to adopt Clue, many of the older and wiser GEMs talked me into waiting because they all thought Clue was too much dog for me and, at that time, they were right. But something had started to happen with Clue and me. I would come home from work each day to be greeted by a symphony of rooing from Clue the minute my key turned the lock in the back door. He would sit with me on the floor in the evening and look up at me with those gigantic brown eyes and sign as if to say, I love you. I was melted by his silly white eyelashes and finally, as Clue became more confident and less likely to take off on a tear at a strange noise I began to believe that no one could possibly love him as much as I did. And I was also convinced that he couldn’t be happy with any other human, which was probably vanity on my part, but I believed it then.

In June, at Darren’s annual barbecue Clue’s adoption contract was signed and I was in it for better or for worse. I took Clue to Trainer’s Academy for obedience classes and in the beginning I was pretty sure I had tossed $225 into the wind in the first few weeks of that. GEM’s were treated to the “Clue Goes to School” narrative that might have been the crude beginning of my writings about the adventures of Clue. He did finally graduate from basic obedience and Devene even suggested that Clue might make a good therapy dog – something that I thought highly unlikely at the time. But at the GEM picnic the following spring Clue took and passed his CGC test on the first try and I was pretty proud of both his and my accomplishment.

I had become pretty good at understanding dog by then and had fostered a lot of other dogs in the mean time. I continued working with Clue and the more we did “homework” the more bonded the two of us became. I once told a friend that my wish is that every dog could be loved by someone as much as Clue was loved by me. Clue was my perfect dog – my heart dog. And I say that with no apology. I love all my dogs, but Clue was the one who clicked with me. Each time I’d take him for a walk, Clue came to my side and sat to have his leash snapped on and he always used that as an opportunity to give me a dog hug. He not only sat, but he sat as close as he could possible get to my side and then rubbed his nose up my leg until I reached down and petted him. I cannot imagine that I will never get that hug from my best boyfriend ever again.

Over the years Clue’s obedience got better and better. He passed his TDI (Therapy Dogs International) test in June of 2007 and almost immediately began his work at Heartland Hospice. He participated in the reading program at Davison’s Central Elementary School last winter and had a couple of kids who only wanted to read to him. One little boy used to put the book right on Clue’s back while Clue stood directly over his chair like a furry table. At the end of the program one little girl hopefully asked me if I thought the program might also be for 2nd graders next year. Clue was always gentle and patient with the kids and he loved his library days. He also had a hospice patient who, ironically, has now outlived him. She considered Clue her very own dog and her first question when she actually became well enough again to be not qualified for Hospice was whether Clue and I would still visit. And as of this writing she is still expecting him to come on Saturday and I dread having to tell her otherwise. She loved his visits and I was so proud of the goodwill Clue generated in this world in his short time in it. He also volunteered at the Highland Township Library’s Reading to Rover program and one of my favorite things in his scrapbook is a thank you not one of the kids’ moms wrote thanking Clue for his work. She said her son looked forward to reading to Clue.

Clue was like no other dog in the world. I loved every part of him from the little tag on his ear that the vet offered to remove during one of his dentals (no!) to his freckled belly and his little white eyelashes. I often told Clue that everyone else only had their 2nd choice dog because I got him. To me he was perfect. I had a silly little song that I sang only to him (Freckle belly boy, freckle belly boy. Momma really loves you, freckle belly boy). He was my freckle belly-brindle face and I beamed with pride every time someone commented on how unusual his markings were. Clue would spin in circles and roo on Saturdays when he got to go to “work” ; he loved life and I loved him.

Dr. Rutsey told me that after she called me to say he wasn’t waking up she stayed right there with him. His heartbeat was regular and strong and he was breathing evenly. Then she said he didn’t take a breath. She checked his heart and it stopped, fluttered and then he went into cardiac arrest. They did try to do CPR, but he couldn’t be revived. My one consolation was that he never woke up so there was not suffering for him.

I stayed and petted Clue until rigor mortis began to set in. He was still warm when I got there, but cold by the time I finally left and they were very patient in allowing me nearly two hours at his side. The vet tech made a clay impression of his paw. Just writing this I have turned around in my chair a few times surprised to not find Clue on the floor behind me. He was always by my side; never clingy, just a shadow beside me wherever I was in the house. There will never be another dog for me like my True Blue Clue. My heart is broken.

Allison Carey

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